Mean Betty on Why Alec Baldwin Skipped the Emmys

-Mean Betty

Did you watch the Emmys on Sunday night, kittens? Meanie certainly did. And, horrors upon horrors, Meanie couldn’t help but notice as she watched that one of her favorite people in the world, the lovely and hilarious Alec Baldwin, was nowhere to be seen. What? No Alec?! Meanie looked again, certain that perhaps she had simply missed him amidst the sea of gorgeous and sometimes questionable fashion. But alas, Meanies eyes were not playing tricks on her. It was true! Alec was missing!

Meanie was, to say the least, concerned. Could something have happened to Alec? Had there been an accident? Was he lying in a ditch, cold, hurt, and alone? Oh, kittens, how could Meanie bear it?

But then this morning, a little bird flitted through the window. Meanie panicked and called the butler to chase the wretched thing out before it ruined the upholstery; but before it finally flapped its way out of the house, it whispered a little story in Meanie’s ear. The bird said this: That the magnificent Alec had opted to skip the Emmy Awards because Fox had the temerity to cut one of Alec’s lines in his opening skit. Gasp! Could it be?

Meanie’s bird told her that Alec’s pre-recorded Emmys skit featured him chatting away on the telephone—then stopping and wagging a verbal finger at Rupert Murdoch for listening in on his conversation. Mr. Murdoch, you’ll recall, owns The News of the World, which has recently gotten into some pretty big trouble over a massive phone hacking scandal. Mr. Murdoch also owns Fox. And apparently he also has no sense of humor, the silly man, because Fox took that light-hearted skit and cut the best line from it, simply because it was a joke at Mr. Murdoch’s expense.

But then the bird said that when Alec heard Fox was cutting the line, which he considered to be the funniest one in the entire skit, he pulled out of the skit altogether. The bird tried to emphasize that this was how Leonard “Mr. Spock” Nimoy ended up in the skit—and slightly miscast at that—but honestly, Meanie was less concerned about the Vulcan and more concerned about what the bird said next: That as a result of this egregious misstep on Fox’s part, Alec ALSO decided to forgo the ENTIRE EMMY AWARDS. Well! Of all the things! Of course it’s upsetting that such a hilarious joke got the axe—because, let’s face it, it really was terribly funny—but Meanie would never have thought that her beloved Alec would behave in such an uncouth fashion! Refusing to attend an event honoring the makers of the noble art of television, simply because of the omission of a single sentence? What terrible manners! Meanie feared she would never be able to look at him, or Jack Donaghy, ever again!

But Meanie should never have bothered listening to that bird, because it LIED. That’s right, kittens, we can all breathe a sigh of relief: While it’s true that Alec did in fact pull out of the Emmys SKIT because of the cut line, he didn’t pull out of the EMMYS because of it. In reality, he had never planned to attend the awards in the first place, because he was already committed to helping singing legend Tony Bennett celebrate his 85th birthday in New York City. And that, kittens, seems to Meanie to be a worthy cause indeed. You see, Alec had penciled Tony’s birthday gala into his schedule a year ago, before the dates of the 2011 Emmy Awards were a glimmer in anyone’s eye. He wasn’t even that concerned about missing a win; he predicted that there was “no chance” that he would take home the statuette for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy. Better to help a friend celebrate such a momentous occasion than to sit for hours on end in a little wooden chair, shifting uncomfortably from buttock to buttock.

Well, Meanie certainly feels a lot better now. And at least she can still watch 30 Rock. Meanie doesn’t know WHAT she would have done without it!